Thoughts and Ideas About The Modern Housecat

Category Archives: Heartwarming

For the month of October, Cat Faeries is celebrating black cats. We will post pictures of our customer’s cuties and donate 1% of our October sales to several black cat rescue groups.

Chloe and Loki snooze together – sent by their cat-mom Roseann

Black cats are the hardest for rescue groups to adopt out and place in loving homes. Do you have a gorgeous black cat or two? Send us their photos! Videos too! We’ll post them on Pinterest, our October newsletters, and on Facebook. Send them to catfaeries@catfaeries.com and put the words Photos for Pinterest in the subject line.

Our delightful customer Kate sent this darling photo of her cat with one of our catnip witch’s hats. We just had to share it with you!

For the month of October 2014, we celebrate black cats. We will be donating 1% of our sales to several black cat rescue groups. Shop with Cat Faeries – help black cats!

Do you have a gorgeous black cat or two? Send us their photos! Videos too! We’ll post them on Pinterest, our October newsletters, and on Facebook. Send them to catfaeries@catfaeries.com and put the words Photos for Pinterest in the subject line.

Black cats are the hardest for rescue groups to adopt out and place in loving homes. They are euthanized more than any other color cat because of silly and antiquated superstitions. Let’s help raise money to support the various black cat rescue groups in the US. Do you know of one? Tell us who they are! We love black cats! We love all cats!

Last week we heard from Shawn again who wanted to tell us about a video featuring two of her cats: Jiminy, and Pinocchio who is blind. Watching them in action, watching them grow up, and seeing how beautifully Pinocchio progresses without eyesight will delight your heart. Love and the vibe of a playful kitten could cure anything! Here’s what Shawn told us:

Aloha! Thank you for your message about the bunnies! Yes, Pinocchio (no eyes), and his “seeing eye” brother, Jiminy, have lots of fun with the toys (as do my 7 other kitties)!

Enjoy this short of video of Pinocchio and Jiminy’s story. They are both two now, and I have been blessed with them since they were kittens.

Shawn (full time rescue mommy and professional violinist)

We asked Shawn to tell us more about living with a blind cat and this is what she had to say:

He is adorable! He definitely has a very heightened sense of smell, which leads him to completely sniff us all over each time we come home. His hearing is absolutely amazing. He hears moths when we can’t even see them. He knows each of the other kitties’ smells and sounds, and he can tell who my husband and I are by our footsteps.

Pinocchio delights us and impresses us every day with his ability to navigate around things, up cat trees; he runs up our flight of stairs at full speed, sometimes forgetting to stop, so he climbs a few extras in the air!

He is very vocal, which is his way for feedback, whether it is to call for his little brother or to find out where mommy is. He is fearless. Most amazing is how he knows how to jump on our bed and off again-truly jumping blindly. He has figured out the distance of everything. He goes into our courtyard and knows his way around. His whiskers help him to not bang into things (except on occasion :)). He also found the kitty door on his own with NO encouragement and figured out how to go in and out by himself.

People may wonder about the litter box. He has NEVER had an accident. I showed him where the kitty box was ONCE and he hasn’t missed it ever. He “covers” but sometimes doesn’t cover all the way! He tries really hard though!

He was shown where the food and water was, and knows right where to go. I even have an extra bowl of water on my night stand for one of my kitties, and he knows how to get to that one. I never showed him.

He can hear the wings of a bird and know exactly where they are. He hasn’t caught a bird but he has caught moths, geckos, and katydids. He will listen intently to a moth and know exactly where it is even though we don’t know it is there. If he smells a gecko, he will be drawn to that area for hours.

Most of my kitties are “misfits”. The sadness I feel for him is unknown to him. He is so, so happy and well adjusted. I was scared at first, and still get anxious when I see him climb or run too fast. But, like people, he has adapted better than seeing kitties. He loves LOVES to snuggle up close. He teaches me something valuable every day about living even though he has a disability. Even as a feline, he has learned to use his other senses remarkably well. I feel pure love from this soul who has changed our world.

So friends, don’t let a disability stop you from loving a blind cat, a cat with 3 legs, or a cat who’s an elder. Cats are miracles that purr and meow! Feeling the love today, thank you Shawn!

Do you have a special or unusual cat that you want to tell us about for our newsletter? A video would be fun, but it’s certainly not necessary. Send a message to catfaeries@catfaeries.com and put My Special Cat in the subject line.

A few years ago we posted an article about how you can help fire fighters save cats caught in fires by donating specially sized oxygen masks for animals (we’ve posted a link to that at the bottom.

Here’s a photo from our local newspaper featuring a fire in the town of Weed, in Northern California (you can imagine the jokes that town gets!) of a fireman holding a cat he found during the big wildfire several days ago, after one of many homes burnt.

The cat looks a lot like our Madeline who was born in that region and came from a shelter 40 miles away! A cousin? Maybe! A big salute to fire fighters!

“That fire was coming in here pretty good,” said Zach Curren, a firefighter from Napa, who worked the blaze near Angel Valley Road. “But we managed to stop it right there,” he said, pointing to a long, white ranch home with a crew of firefighters spraying down a smoldering roof.

In his arms he held a gray cat he had just found hiding under a pile of clothes in a house across the street from the smoking home. The neighborhood was deserted except for fire crews, and as the whoosh of hoses and grinding of engines filled the air, the cat shivered.

A customer of ours told us about Mara DiGrazia, a veterinarian on Long Island. “She has donated hundreds of animal-sized oxygen masks to numerous fire departments throughout Long Island so they can dispense oxygen properly to animals who are rescued from fires. Without those masks, sadly many beloved animals die even though firefighters heroically rescue them from the flames of the fire because they couldn’t receive life-saving oxygen properly. This is something that makes perfect sense yet I never thought about until I heard Mara was doing it.”

Look at those sweet gray muzzles! What cuties! And so very brave. These hero dogs helped search for people in the rubble following 9/11. In 2012 when we first posted this story there were 12.

Only one of these dogs is still alive. Bretagne, a 15 year old golden retriever, still works as a service dog helping special needs kids by listening to them read out loud. For more on Bretagne here’s an excellent article on the Today Show site – “Last known 9/11 Ground Zero search dog still lends a helping paw”. Here’s a current picture taken by her 9/11 handler and current companion, Denise Corliss.

Her she is with Denise working at the World Trade Center site in 2001.

In 2012, Dutch photographer Charlotte Dumas traveled to nine states to photograph the 12 remaining dogs, then in their golden years, at their homes. She produced a book of the photographs titled “Retrieved.”

Here is the story and their photos. These are from a wonderful article written by Charles Mayfield. Unfortunately, even after much Google searching, we can’t find the original source. Below is the article that includes pictures of 2012’s 12 surviving dogs.

Wishing you a day of reflection on the lives lost, the hearts broken, but the spirit of everyone who was touched by the events on September 11, 2001 remains strong. The rescue dogs who have crossed The Rainbow Bridge are surely held in the highest esteem, and we like to imagine that they are being given lots of love and treats by those who perished on that horrible day.

Nearly 100 dogs worked at the trade center ten years ago; only 12 are left. THESE OLD WONDERFUL FACES SAY IT ALL… These are the surviving dogs that worked the trade center that are still alive but retired, they are heroes too.

Their eyes say everything you need to know about them. Just amazing creatures. True heroes of 9/11 still with us today.

Moxie, 13, from Winthrop , Massachusetts , arrived with her handler, Mark Aliberti, at the World Trade Center on the evening of September 11 and searched the site for eight days.

Tara, 16, from Ipswich, Massachusetts, arrived at the World Trade Center on the night of the 11th. The dog and her handler Lee Prentiss were there for eight
days.

Kaiser, 12, pictured at home in Indianapolis, Indiana, was deployed to the World Trade Center on September 11 and searched tirelessly for people in the rubble.

Bretagne and his owner Denise Corliss from Cypress, Texas, arrived at the site in New York on September 17, remaining there for ten days.

Guinness, 15, from Highland, California, started work at the sitewith Sheila McKee on the morning of September 13 and was deployed at the site for 11 days.

Merlyn and his handler Matt Claussen were deployed to Ground Zero on September 24, working the night shift for five days.

Red, 11, from Annapolis, Maryland, went with Heather Roche to the Pentagon from September 16 until the 27 as part of the Bay Area Recovery Canines.

Abigail, above, was deployed on the evening of September 17, searching for 10 days while Tuff arrived in New York at 11:00 pm onthe day of attack to start working early the next day.

Handler Julie Noyes and Hoke were deployed to the World Trade Center from their home in Denver on September 24 and searched for five days.

Scout and another unknown dog lie among the rubble at Ground Zero, just two of nearly 100 search and rescue animals who helped to search for survivors.

During the chaos of the 9/11 attacks, where almost 3,000 people died, nearly 100 loyal search and rescue dogs and their brave owners scoured Ground Zero for survivors. Now, ten years on, just 12 of these heroic canines survive, and they have been commemorated in a touching series of portraits entitled Retrieved.

The dogs worked tirelessly to search for anyone trapped alive in the rubble, along with countless emergency service workers and members of the public.

Traveling across nine states in the U.S. from Texas to Maryland, Dutch photographer Charlotte Dumas, 34, captured the remaining dogs in their twilight days in their twilight years in their homes where they still live with their handlers, a full decade on from 9/11. Their stories have now been compiled in a book, called Retrieved, which was published on the tenth anniversary of the attacks. Noted for her touching portraits of animals, especially dogs, Charlotte wanted Retrieved to mark not only the anniversary of the September 2001 attacks, but also as recognition for some of the first responders and their dogs. “I felt this was a turning point, especially for the dogs, who although are not forgotten, are not as prominent as the human stories involved, “explained Charlotte, who splits her time between New York and Amsterdam .” They speak to us as a different species, and animals are greatly important for our sense of empathy and to put things into perspective.”

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